All Episodes Talk: Season 1

[Lisin]

A place to discuss particular episodes, arcs and moments from the show's run. Please remember this isn't a complete catch-all topic -- check out the forum for character topics and other places for show-related talk.

[Lisin]

Here's Sarah's first write up for the rewatch! Please take individual episode talk into the correct thread, but general talk is welcome here. 

[Joe Hellandback]

On ‎21‎/‎05‎/‎2014 at 5:04 PM, Lisin said:

Here's Sarah's first write up for the rewatch! Please take individual episode talk into the correct thread, but general talk is welcome here. 

Season 1 is very interesting, we have the seeds of greatness here but they very much write it within budget and with the idea that they might only get 12 eps so they'll have to resolve everything in that time, hence the relative lack of arc and a great many MOTW eps. It has much more the feel of the original Buffy movies than the amazing, groundbreaking series it was to become. Also there's the special effects which don't quite measure up yet, the cheapness of effective CGI developed in the 90s making all the difference. But on the whole had we only ever had these 12 eps it would still have been a fondly remembered series (like Tru Calling, Cover Up or Space;AAB). Personally I didn't really become a fan until BBB in season 2, I watched it idly much as I did Charmed, Dark Angel etc.  

[Halting Hex]

On July 22, 2018 at 3:13 AM, nosleepforme said:

I'm always amazed by how much Buffy - and to a lesser extend- Giles changed throughout the run of the show.

They change pretty quickly over the 12 episodes; her going from being pissed off at him and his being baffled by her to him wanting to sacrifice his life to spare hers and her refusing to allow it.

Quote

XANDER:  Yeah, Buffy died and everything!

WILLOW:  Wow. Harsh.

GILES:  I should have known that wouldn't have stopped you.

Indeed not, Rupert;  indeed not. :)  What's a little thing like "inescapably prophesied death" to Our Girl?

On July 22, 2018 at 3:13 AM, nosleepforme said:

the music is not all that great

Really?  I think there are a lot of winners on the S1 soundtrack from "Job's Eyes" by Far in The Pack (the slo-mo prowl) to "Let the Sun Fall Down" by Sophie Zelmani in Angel (the final scene) to "Inconsolable" by Jonatha Brooke in Prophecy Girl (Buffy wistfully looking at her dress), I thought the music was used pretty well, even if there were too many episodes where the budget didn't allow for anything other than stock.  But JMO.

[Halting Hex]

Ah, okay, true.  (And let's not forget Murray & Clement, for that matter.  Even if I am too lazy to look up their respective middle initials and spellings of "Sean/Shaun", at the moment.)

But Walter Murphy (and the Big Apple Band!) did bring us "A Fifth of Beethoven" back in the disco days, so I forgive him.  (And apparently he's prospered with Seth MacFarlane, winning an Emmy™ for an episode of Family Guy and the Oscar™ for a song from Ted, but my MacFarlane tolerance is limited, so I didn't know that.)

Edited July 24, 2018 by Halting Hex

[Halting Hex]

4 hours ago, nosleepforme said:

Murray and Clement are easy to forget, because they scored just a couple of episodes

Actually, for the majority of S2, they alternate episodes with Chris Beck.  Beck does When She Was Bad, Adam Fields (who went on to do Dawson's Creek) does Some Assembly Required (although Beck has "Daryl's Theme" there), and then Shaun & Sean do the odd-numbered episodes for a while.  ("Spike Arrives", from School Hard, is their work, for example.)

What Joss really valued from them was that they could write original songs, not just instrumentals.   ("Wolves" and "She Breaks" in Reptile Boy, for example.)  I assume he figured they could save a bit on the guest bands that way.  But by the end of the season, Beck had the gig full-time.

And wow, this is so OT for S1.  Sorry.

[Halting Hex]

On the S1 topic, I was reading the old archives of the XMission mailing list (gotta love contemporary reactions) and they were trying to ascertain whether the kids were all the same age based on the classes they were taking.  Obviously, they're all taking Psychology in Nightmares, but there's enough overlap elsewhere to confirm that they're all sophomores, even though that isn't made explicit until later seasons.

• Cordelia and Buffy take European History (Welcome to the Hellmouth) and American History (The Puppet Show, Nightmares) together.  These are not the same class; the Euro History teacher is played by Natalie Strauss, while Mrs. Jackson in The Puppet Show is played by Lenora May.  (A male teacher is seen in Nightmares, but he could just be proctoring the test that Buffy is unprepared for.)  And we do know that Buffy is taking both classes, as seen by Joyce's lack of surprise when Darla specifies which class she's tutoring Buffy for in Angel.

• Buffy, Willow and Xander take Biology together (Witch, Teacher's Pet, Prophecy Girl).  They also have P.E. together (The Pack).  We get further confirmation that Buffy and Willow take P.E. together in I Robot, You Jane, but we only see them in the girls' locker room, so it's understandable that Xander is absent then.

• Willow, Xander and Cordelia all take Mrs. Miller's class in Out of Mind, Out of Sight.  It's not specified if this is a Shakespeare class, or just a general Literature section (the protagonist of the work they're discussing in the flashback with Marcie is unnamed), nor is it stated whether the Marcie scenes are one of the four classes W/X had with her "last year" or if that's fall semester from this year.  (I would think that Marcie's going invisible has to be a relatively recent development, else why would she wait until now to start attacking Cordy & friends?  We do know that she was visible before Mitch went out for spring baseball, though.)

• Willow and Cordelia and Harmony are in the same computer lab in The Harvest, but only Willow is seen in Jenny's class in I Robot, You Jane.  Are there multiple sections sharing lab time together?  I suppose that's possible.

• Are Willow and Xander taking Chemistry together?  In The Harvest, in the "Rain of Toads" scene, Willow says we should get to class, and later in the tunnels with Buffy, Xander says he's skipping Chem, but when we next see Willow, she's in the computer lab.  Did enough time pass that we're onto Willow's next class?  Or did she have Comp Lab, while Xander had Chem?  And why is Xander taking both Chemistry and Biology in the same year, anyway?

• What's up with Xander and math?  Willow is tutoring him in Geometry in The Pack, but she suggested he get a Trigonometry book in Welcome to the Hellmouth.  Gee, no wonder he has a problem with the math (what part? the math) if he doesn't even know what course he's taking.  

Is Willow tutoring him because they're taking math together, or is she just in it for the shiny nickels?  I kind of think that his saying "the math" indicates that this is something they're both studying, but then how do we account for the Geometry studies five episodes later? 

Arrgh.  My brain hurts.

[illdoc]

For the record, I actually did take Trig the year before Geometry! Not exactly intentionally. I was taking Algebra freshman year and at some point we filled out what classes we wanted for the following year (obviously, Geometry follows Algebra). Some time after that, they found out about some test I had taken in eighth grade and decided to try me out in Trig while taking Algebra, and when I did well, dropped me from Algebra and had me in the Trig class as my freshman math (yes, everyone else in Trig were juniors/seniors). When sophomore year started, I was in the Geometry class. I tried to get moved from it, but the counselor said "you'll learn something" Yeah, well... So I took Geometry sophomore year and then Advanced Algebra/Analytic Geometry my junior year (yes, everyone else was a senior). No more math classes available, so I ended up with a computer class (punch card readers---that's how long ago this was) senior year. 

Anyway, taking PE class together does mean you are the same schoolclass/age, but maybe not for the other classes. In my high school, there was "freshman English", etc., but anyone could take Bio/Chemistry/Psych.  It's also remotely possible that Xander was taking Trig in WttH, but realized that he was out of his depth, dropped Trig and took (the easier) Geometry instead by The Pack.  As to Chemistry, wasn't Xander taking Chemistry in Go Fish? I thought he said something about "making up a Chem final then having his blood replaced with the remaining swim team"

[Halting Hex]

The girls of S1:

They look great, of course (nice that they've found the blonde/brunette/redhead stratification), but I can only give Susanna Puisto credit for two out of the three outfits.  Buffy's symphony in blue works, and you have to worry about Cordy's leopard skirt, but she pulls it off.  But poor Willow, with not a great sweater (note the too-long sleeves) and that fruit-basket nightmare of a skirt.  Ugh.

[Joe Hellandback]

14 hours ago, Halting Hex said:

The girls of S1:

They look great, of course (nice that they've found the blonde/brunette/redhead stratification), but I can only give Susanna Puisto credit for two out of the three outfits.  Buffy's symphony in blue works, and you have to worry about Cordy's leopard skirt, but she pulls it off.  But poor Willow, with not a great sweater (note the too-long sleeves) and that fruit-basket nightmare of a skirt.  Ugh.

He mom probably picked it out for her? What strikes me here is the efforts they go to in order to make them all seem about the same height, 

[illdoc]

8 minutes ago, Joe Hellandback said:

nice that they've found the blonde/brunette/redhead stratification)

Technically, they are all brunettes---Sarah's hair was lightened so she was more blond and Alyson's hair was died so that they would have blond/burnette/redhead.

[Joe Hellandback]

4 minutes ago, illdoc said:

Technically, they are all brunettes---Sarah's hair was lightened so she was more blond and Alyson's hair was died so that they would have blond/burnette/redhead.

And SMG changes her hair later as she looked too like another character who appears in season 3. 

[Halting Hex]

Oh, of course you can see they're all natural brunettes; Aly barely has a hint of red in Welcome to the Hellmouth and there are a few S1 episodes where Sarah's highlights are more of a suggestion than anything else.  That's why I said they'd "found" the stratification, after all.  It definitely wasn't a natural occurrence.

[Halting Hex]

Because I have nothing else to do with my life (HA!), I'm now reading a different set of unspoiled reviews, and this one points out that virtually every episode of S1 ends up at the school, bar the cliffhanger at the end of the pilot and the Bronze scene that finished off Angel.  It's a very school-centric season.

Spoiler

In constrast, the first seven episodes of S2 feature only one episode (Inca Mummy Girl) that ended up at school…and that was a leftover S1 script.  There's some school-centric endings in the middle of the season (from The Dark Age through Passion), but it's more diverse for the most part.

[Joe Hellandback]

On ‎12‎/‎10‎/‎2018 at 3:14 AM, Halting Hex said:

Because I have nothing else to do with my life (HA!), I'm now reading a different set of unspoiled reviews, and this one points out that virtually every episode of S1 ends up at the school, bar the cliffhanger at the end of the pilot and the Bronze scene that finished off Angel.  It's a very school-centric season.

  Hide contents

In constrast, the first seven episodes of S2 feature only one episode (Inca Mummy Girl) that ended up at school…and that was a leftover S1 script.  There's some school-centric endings in the middle of the season (from The Dark Age through Passion), but it's more diverse for the most part.

Essentially they didn't have much but the school back then.

[Halting Hex]

True, but…

Spoiler

several early S2 episodes reached their conclusion on non-SHS sets that already existed in S1.  The cemetery (Some Assembly Required, Lie to Me), The Bronze (Reptile Boy), and Buffy's bedroom (Halloween) were holdovers, ditto for sets used later in the season, such as Angel's apartment (WML1, Surprise) and Buffy's living room (Innocence).  The only new build involved was the Factory (When She Was Bad, School Hard).

IMO it was more of a case of making better use of what they already had than any great expansion.

[lembergwatcher]

Sorry for being nostalgic, but...

[Joe Hellandback]

On 11/2/2020 at 2:40 PM, lembergwatcher said:

Sorry for being nostalgic, but...

Ah the dayglow 90s!

[lembergwatcher]

Previously unreleased photos from season 1 courtesy of Susanna Puisto, Buffy's original costume designer.
 

[Halting Hex]

"See, put Sarah in heels and keep Aly in flats and they're the same height.  Thus making the kissing scenes easier more aesthetically balanced."

(In my defense, that is an I Robot, You Jane pic.)

(

[Halting Hex]

I don't recall if we've has this particular S1 promo pic here before:

…but even if so, "Slay Gal chillin' in Church" is a theme worth repeating, I say.

[Halting Hex]

Xander, trying to stay poker-faced while getting some touch.

Buffy, wondering where Willow Giles Cordelia Angel has gone to…

(He's at the junior high, scouting up possible replacements, Buff.)